Australian orgs can't identify 41% of network traffic

Australian IT managers on average are unable to identify 41% of their organisation’s network traffic, creating significant security and legal concerns, according to a new study from Sophos.

The global survey also found that nearly one in four IT managers worldwide can’t identify 70% of their network traffic.

Nearly nine in ten (87%) Australian organisations agree that a lack of application visibility poses a serious traffic concern, as without visibility into network traffic, IT managers are unable to detect ransomware, malware, data breaches and other advanced threats.

Malicious actors are able to hide attack traffic from firewalls with signature-based detection capabilities through the use of encryption, browser emulation and advanced evasion techniques.

Half of Australian IT managers are meanwhile concerned about productivity loss from unwanted applications they can’t see on their networks.

The lack of traffic visibility means it takes Australian organisations an average of seven hours to identify, isolate and remediate the infected machines within their networks — a major concern considering the recent revelation that 40% of professional hackers say they can exfiltrate data from a breached network in less than an hour.

“If you can’t see everything on your network, you can’t ever be confident that your organisation is protected from threats. IT professionals have been ‘flying blind’ for too long and cybercriminals take advantage of this,” Sophos Senior VP and GM of Products Dan Schiappa said.

“With governments worldwide introducing stiffer penalties for data breach and loss, knowing who and what is on your network is becoming increasingly important. This dirty secret can’t be ignored any longer.”

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/fuzzbones

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